Fabrizio Sotti & Friends

Blue Note Jazz Festival Presents

Fabrizio Sotti & Friends

with special guests Ray Angry, Tony Grey, Mino Cinelu, Algebra Blessett, M1 of Dead Prez, Claudia Acuña, Melanie Fiona, Alberto Pizzo & Res

Wednesday, June 4, 2014

Fabrizio Sotti has created a beautiful fusion of musical worlds on his latest full-length solo album, Right Now.

The world-renowned Italian jazz guitar virtuoso, producer, and songwriter successfully strikes a delicate balance between jazz and pop. It's only natural given his legacy of diverse musical collaborations—which spans writing, producing and playing for everybody from Cassandra Wilson, Dead Prez, Q Tip, Estelle, Foxy Brown, K’naan, Melanie Fiona, Tupac and Jennifer Lopez to Whitney Houston and Gipsy Kings. However, on his latest record, the gap is effectively bridged as his impeccable chops meet irresistible melodies. Encompassing interpretations of six classic songs as well as six originals, he paints an intimate portrait of his personal history, and he also provides a glimpse at the future.

After releasing the highly acclaimed collaboration Another Country with Cassandra Wilson, he began working on Right Now in early 2012 with a fresh perspective. Since first moving to New York from Italy in 1991, he's solidified himself as a premier presence in the jazz world with solo releases including 1999’s This World Upside Down, 2004's Through My Eyes and 2010's Inner Dance. He's worked with prominent genre stalwarts including Al Foster, Randy Brecker, Roy Hargrove, John Patitucci, George Garzone, Cassandra Wilson,Terry-Lyne Carrington, Claudia Acuna to name a few. However, from the moment he started the sessions for Right Now with bassist Tony Grey and drummer Mino Cinelu, he knew that this collection would stand out from his extensive body of work.

"I've been blessed to have two careers, but they were always separate" he admits. "My career as a songwriter and producer has been primarily based in popular music, while as a recording artist, I've focused on the jazz field. Another Country prepared me to break some ground this time. I tried to write jazz with a pop feel. This came out of a spiritual necessity for me. I wanted to open up. It's very different from my previous work as an artist, but it's also very honest."

As he captured that honesty, he invited some notable friends to join him in the studio. On a heartfelt reimagining of Bob Marley's "Waitin' In Vain", his nuanced and intricate acoustic guitar playing matches up with smooth and soulful delivery from Shaggy and Res. The track holds a place in Sotti's heart for a myriad of reasons.

"Everybody loves Bob Marley," he affirms. "I had to do something special for this though. In the mid-nineties, I joined the Air Force in Italy because it was mandatory. They stationed me on the border of Yugoslavia in the middle of the war. 'Mr. Boombastic' came out, and people were blasting Shaggy all the time. The song comforted me during a very dark and tense period. I wanted Shaggy to do this with me because of that. He performed from his heart, and the track shows a different side of him. Also, Res sounds both fragile and communicative. Everything comes together really well."

The same could be said for the swaggering collaboration with Ice T and M1 of Dead Prez on Pink Floyd's "The Wall". His elegant musical arrangement stirs a potent brew of hip-hop and classical, fortified by flashes of instrumental fireworks.
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Fabrizio Sotti: The Key to Music

By FERNANDO RODRIGUEZ, Published: December 25, 2012

Invited to perform at the 16th edition of the Dominican Republic Jazz Festival, this past November, guitarist Fabrizio Sotti was sitting on the beach in Cabarete, along the country's north coast, when this interview took place.

Sottis' most recent release, Inner Dance (E1, 2010), was almost his third release, following the guitarist's This World Upside Down (BCI-Eclipse, 1999), but a hard drive crash on his computer scuttled what was to be his sophomore release, originally to be titled Against All Odds. Inner Dance features slightly different personnel, with organist Sam Barsh replacing bassist James Genus, alongside a twin-percussion salvo of drummer Victor Jones and percussionist/drummer Mino CInelu. Moving between harder-edged, fusion-esque electric and more lyrical acoustic guitars, it may have been a tough slog getting there, but Inner Dance definitely delivers the goods.

Sotti was born in Padova, Italy. By age five, he was taking classical piano lessons, and at nine switched to the guitar as his interests in music went from Bach and Chopin to trumpeter Miles Davis, saxophonist John Coltrane, and guitarists Wes Montgomery andJimi Hendrix. After a stay in the USA in his mid-teens, he returned to New York City permanently and launched his jazz career after a brief stint in the mid-90s in the Italian Air Force. Since then, Sotti's career has included collaborations with some of jazz's best musicians to writing/producing for hip-hop and pop superstars.

In addition to his own recordings, Sotti has produced and performed on two Blue Note albums for Grammy Award-winning vocalist Cassandra Wilson—2003's Glamoured and 2009s Closer To You: The Pop Side. He has toured extensively in the U.S. and Europe and worked with an impressive group of A-listers including trumpeters Brian Lynch and Roy Hargrove, saxophonists George Coleman and George Garzone, bassists Steve La Spinaand Mark Egan, percussionists Sammy Figueroa and Mino Cinelu, drummers Al Foster andJeff "Tain" Watts, guitarist Mick Goodrick, and pianists Rachel Z and Andy LaVerne.

Expanding his musical palette into the world of hip-hop and R&B, Fabrizio has played with, written and produced tracks for everyone from Dead Prez, Q- Tip, Tupac (the posthumous "If I Fail") and Ghostface Killah to Jennifer Lopez, Whitney Houston, Foxy Brown and Half Pint.

Sotti says that: "I agree with Duke Ellington in his assessment that there are only two kinds of music, good and bad, and I choose not to discriminate by genre."

All About Jazz: In your own words, who is Fabrizio Sotti?

Fabrizio Sotti: I'm a jazz guitarist/musician who doesn't discriminate other genres of music.

AAJ: How did you get to New York?

FS: The first time I came to New York I was 16 years old. I came to New York City because I wanted to play and learn from the best jazz musicians in the world. I told my mother I was going to the US for a short vacation, but I knew I wasn't going to go back home.

AAJ: How and when did you start playing?

FS: I started studying classical piano at the age of five, learning from my grandmother to write and read music. At age nine I picked up the guitar and also my musical preferences started to change.

AAJ: How did you get into jazz?

FS: In Padova, where I grew up, there weren't any jazz schools when I started, so I took some private lessons from local teachers, studied American books and listened to a lot of vinyl.

AAJ: What were your studies like? Where?

FS: The majority was in Padova, with locals teachers; occasionally, I attended seminars by American guitarists visiting Italy like Joe Diorio and Mick Goodrick.

AAJ: What have your experiences been in Italy, Europe, and now in the US?

FS: In Italy, when I was a teenager, I had the opportunity to play with great musicians like [bassist] Ares Tavolazzi, [drummer] Mauro Beggio, [drummer] Francesco Lomagistro, [bassist] Christian Lisi and [bassist] Nicola Sorato. With them, I played standards and some of my original tunes. With these musicians we played all over Italy. As well as playing with jazz groups, I was also working as a session musicians for Italian pop artists to make some more money.
Read more: http://musicians.allaboutjazz.com/musician.php?id=20849#.UNlqTaUlYhQ